February 2008 - Hi Sarah,

I just wanted to email you to tell you about my cocker spaniel, Bella, and what a difference TTouch has made to her.

Bella was attacked on 3 or 4 occasions in her first year, by staffies and bull terriers, both on and off the lead, and in the space of a few months went from being really friendly with other dogs to being really tense and snappy. It escalated to the point where she would snap at any dog who came anywhere near her and I tried all kinds of things to help get her over it - clickering worked to an extent but then any incident where a boisterous dog would bound up to her would set her back months and months. I knew that I was getting really tense on walks as well which I knew wasn't helping her at all.

I had one of the TTouch books ("getting in TTouch…") which I've had for a while and decided to give it a go as it couldn't do any harm. I'm probably not doing half the touches properly at all but have been giving Bella massages since November and gradually she has come to really, really enjoy them to the point that I get requests from her 3 or 4 times a day! She holds lots of tension in her shoulders and if I massage them she will push her whole body weight onto me as hard as possible to get me to really loosen them up for her. She loves the body lifts and also the Python TTouch (she literally grunts with pleasure at that one!).

Anyway there was no change in her behaviour for the first month or so, but gradually over the last few weeks we have really noticed a difference. She began having the odd day where she'd actually say hello nicely to dogs who came up to her (we'd think it was a fluke as it would maybe be a small dog, but then she'd also say hello to a big lab and previously this hadn't happened). But then she'd still have real off days where it was just like before. But for the last 4 weeks when we have taken her out, she has met lots and lots of strange dogs and has consistently been far, far more relaxed. Before, she would only stand nose to nose with another dog, with her tail up, curling her lip and then snapping if the dog didn't walk away quickly enough. She would never allow another dog to sniff her and wouldn't want to sniff the other dog either. But now she is spending long periods of time saying hello, bum sniffing all round and wagging her tail. She has done this for 4 weekends on the trot now (during the week we go to a park where she knows everyone so it's different but at weekends we go to a bigger park full of unknowns).

Even dogs that bound up to her will now maybe still get an air snap but then she will actually cut that short and stop and say hello nicely instead.

It really is like watching her turn into a different dog and I am convinced it is the massage which has done this - I'm actually planning to go on one of your courses now so that I can learn how to do it properly.

But I just wanted to say thank you - it has improved Bella's life a lot so far and I am definitely keeping it up.

Best wishes
Claire

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